NOVEL

The African Gentleman

…and The Plot to Re-establish The New World Order

A Novel by Fred Beauford

Chapters 26-27

26

I found myself constantly thinking about Gladys. I have never had children and I couldn’t help but imagine the kind of offspring we would produce. I knew that I was about as African as you can get these daysand she was still a Northern European, despite whatever else she called herself.

A friend, who had a similar background to mine, and who married a woman a lot like Gladys, told me a story that turned very sad, indeed.

“”I have three girls,” he explained, “and there it is still the white skin that gets all the attention. What are girls to do? What can I say to them when I myself preferred a white skin to sleep with?” he asked, with genuine anguish in his voice.

I had nothing to say to him, but his comments did stir something deep inside of me.

27

Whatever the case, Gladys is turning into one strange bird, but I suppose that is just her artistic nature and that is just the way novelists behave.

Still, I found it strange indeed when she said to me as we lay in her bed something totally unsuspected.

Yes, I finally got around to bedding her, or her bedding me, as the case may be, and it was loads of fun. Too bad I am not a novelist like her. I would describe in delicious, salacious, vivid details how I brought her to a mighty, glorious orgasm.

I do have one fixed memory of our first hours in bed. We were at her place across the River. It must have been two or three in the morning. I had not been in bed with a woman since Liz Gant left, and this also was the first time in ages that I had slept in someone else’s bed. That’s why I had resorted in desperation to Craigslist, where I met Rosy, who by the way just called me out of the blue.

But these first hours in Gladys’ cozy bed, who wanted to sleep?! I just wanted to enjoy her warm body, her aliveness. I held her tight and enjoyed the moments, as she quietly slept, the blissful calm interrupted only occasionally by a loud snore, which gave me great delight. I also delighted as she breathed in and out, that she seemed at peace with both herself, and the world.

All at once I felt something biting at the hands that gave Gladys so much comfort. These were sharp, purposeful bits. It was the big tabby. I pushed him away, and immediately fell into a deep sleep, my arms still wrapped tightly around Gladys.

But soon, there were the same sharp little bits again, with the same grim purpose. It was clear, even in my sleepy haze, that the tabby did not like the fact that I had my arms around Gladys.

I later asked her what was up with Morris.

“Well, it’s like this, he doesn’t know that he’s a cat, and thinks that he’s my husband.”

***

I don’t have the talent to go on with bedroom scenes, so suffice it to say we were lying in her bed together, with both the jealous tabby, and the demure long hair starting intently at us, when quite surprisingly Gladys said, “I am done with that novel.”

I had asked her if she had anything for me to read.

“What? You’re joking.”

“No joke.”

“Why? Don’t you want to finish it?”

“I want to finish it, but it doesn’t want me to. It said, whoa, enough!” Gladys let out a little laugh, clearly pleased at her wit.

I was nonplussed. “But it was so good. I mean, that person, whoever it was, floating around, trapped forever in a vast nothingness, trying to find its way back to the life of the living so it could tell them what it was really all about--was brilliant .”

“Well, thank you for the kind words, but I just can’t get it to work. I think I was over my head with that one. That’s how it goes in this business.”

I was amazed at how passive and matter of fact she was about the whole thing. She was just going to take 158 pages of something so good and just lock it away forever on her hard drive.

She obviously noticed the look of puzzlement on my face.

“Hey, hey, dude, it’s no big deal. It happens all the time. If it doesn’t fit, don’t force it. Maybe I will turn it into a long short story, or maybe it will all come together tomorrow. But meanwhile I started another one.

“A novel?”

“Who knows?”

“Can I read it?”

I saw the hesitation I had seen before when I first asked to read the last offering. Perhaps she might now have concluded that I jinxed it, and may do the same thing again.

But that look quickly disappeared from her face.

“Well, I think this is a story you can relate to.”

“Oh, how’s that?”

Wow, was my wish finally coming true? Was I now going to walk boldly on her pages, finally becoming the literary hero I so coveted? Had I finally arrived, my reward for bringing her to such a powerful climax? It’s a good thing I remember how to service a woman in bed even though it had been a little over a year since Liz Gant walked out on me, leaving me sexless and alone.